I note with some amusement that, like most tourists to Japan, Card becomes a "five-minute expert" in cultural elements ("But that's the point -- only when someone is physically pushing them will Japanese people allow themselves to intrude into someone else's space." -- the HELL?) as did Tom Cruise and others. I still remember twitching seeing Tom Cruise on the late night shows after filming "Dances With Samurai" and expounding on Japanese culture and society as if he were an expert.

AJBryant wrote:("But that's the point -- only when someone is physically pushing them will Japanese people allow themselves to intrude into someone else's space." -- the HELL?)

We don't have "pushers" at my station, and people crowd in reeeeeal nice

who is an otaku (devotee of animé and manga)

HA!

Only afterward did I realize that I had just done something appallingly rude. Until I did that, the young woman was invisible. Her sneezing, her nose-wiping -- none of them had actually happened until I called attention to it by offering the Kleenex.

This was interesting!

...And I liked how he had to point out exactly which train line it was and where he was heading.

He really babbles towards the end. I think he has become an otaku (devotee of animé and manga) himself.

...And I liked how he had to point out exactly which train line it was and where he was heading.

That I attribute to good writing habits. A writer as published as he is will almost never write something vague like, "I was driving down the street." out of habit, not when he himself keeps teaching would-be writers to always write using concrete examples. Instead, he would have to deliberately choose to be vague, which means he would need whatever he considers a good reason.

Infidel wrote: A writer as published as he is will almost never write something vague like, "I was driving down the street." out of habit

A don't know... Since his audience is mostly people who have no idea where those places are, it seems like "I was on the train" would be more than sufficient.

And when a sci-fi/fantasy writer writes, you do know where they are talking about? Luke Skywalker didn't walk into "a bar" he went to "Mos Eisley Cantina" Nightmare on a street has a whole different ring than Nightmare on Elm street. Where the heck is elm street anyway? Dorothy didn't walk down just any old road, she walked down the yellow brick road. Etc...